"Yikes! You okay?" Ryan asked, his face contorted with horror at the sight of Denzel's battered form.
"Yeah, just got into a little scuffle," Denzel replied, waving it off with a crooked smile.
"A little scuffle? Bro, it looks like you got trampled by a herd of ogres. This story's getting harder to believe by the second." Ryan scratched his chin, eyeing Denzel with suspicion.
"I'm here now, aren't I? Let's just drop it and go find the monster," Denzel said quickly, trying to change the subject.
Ryan narrowed his eyes. Denzel hadn't answered the question—and that worried him. Something was off. But for now, he let it slide.
Without another word, the two ventured deeper into the cave, finally exiting the extra-dimensional space.
The tunnel gradually widened with each step. The deeper they went, the colder and vaster it became. Instinct kicked in—they knew something big was waiting.
"I think we found our monster," Ryan muttered, stopping in his tracks. His eyes began to glow faintly with sparks of lightning, lips curling into a crooked grin.
After a week of searching, they had finally found their target.
The tunnel opened up into a massive, icy cavern strewn with skeletons—remnants of failed adventurers. At the center stood a towering woolly mammoth with two enormous, spiraled tusks, each over two meters long.
Denzel whistled low. "Yup... that's our boss."
"Denzel, we need a plan," Ryan whispered, staring up at the creature with a mix of awe and dread.
"You're telling me," Denzel replied grimly. "If this mission means what I think it does, then we've got to be surgical with this. One wrong step and we're mammoth chow."
He stepped forward, his foot pressing into the icy ground.
The moment his boot touched the frozen surface, the beast's bright blue eyes snapped open.
The floor shuddered.
[System Warning: This floor requires a minimum of 7 players.]
"Guess we're breaking the rules again," Ryan muttered.
"Like always," Denzel smirked.
[System Warning: Due to accumulated fatigue, all stats reduced by 50%.]
"Perfect," Denzel grumbled as he broke off a shard of ice, channeling aura into it.
He hurled it at the mammoth.
Tink.
No effect.
The mammoth responded with a swing of its trunk. It cleaved through half the icy field in a single swipe. Denzel and Ryan narrowly dodged by launching themselves into the air, hearts pounding as fatigue slowed their movements.
Attack after attack followed in a coordinated rhythm—lightning strikes from Ryan, aura-infused jabs from Denzel—but nothing was working. The mammoth was a fortress of muscle and frost.
"We're not scratching it," Ryan growled. "I'm going to try something big. Keep it distracted."
"Copy that!" Denzel shouted, already moving.
He grabbed another jagged ice spike, infused it with wind magic, and launched himself skyward with a gust. "Hey, oversized popsicle! Catch this!"
He hurled the spike at the mammoth's eye, aura swirling around it like a drill.
The projectile landed squarely against the beast's face—and bounced off.
Still no damage.
But Denzel grinned all the same. "That's the best I can do, Ryan!"
"Thanks… now get out of the way!" Ryan shouted, crouched low with sparks flying off his body.
~Lightning Energy Laser~
Ryan gathered an enormous sphere of condensed lightning and, with a yell, fired it in a concentrated beam.
BOOOOOM!
The beam slammed into the mammoth's right tusk. The massive tusk cracked and fell, crashing into the ground with a quake-like impact.
But something had changed.
The mammoth roared—its once-bright blue eyes turned a deep, blood-red. Steam hissed from the ice around it, melting into vapor.
Ryan's voice trembled. "It… it's changing."
A dual-nature monster?
He turned to Denzel, expecting a plan. A grin. Something.
But for the first time—Denzel looked confused.
"This… this never happened before," he muttered, his face pale.
Above them a voice spoke..
"This should be enough to take care of the rogue. Sorry, Player Ryan, but your friend is too dangerous."
A woman with glimmering fairy wings and an elegant, otherworldly beauty floated high above them. It was Lola—the administrator of the lower floors.
She waved a hand. "I've unlocked the Ice Mammoth's hidden potential. Enjoy."
[System Notice: Floor Boss, Ice Mammoth, has been modified.]
She vanished in a blink.
Ryan's jaw dropped. "We're going to die."
The mammoth charged.
It unleashed crimson ice spears that radiated not cold—but blistering heat. Denzel and Ryan dodged wildly, barely keeping pace as the temperature shifted from freezing to scorching.
The mammoth stomped the ground, fracturing the entire icy terrain and sending them both flying.
Before they could recover, its trunk slammed into them mid-air, launching them into the cave walls like ragdolls.
They hit hard. Blood smeared against stone. Ryan groaned, barely conscious. Denzel, already injured from before, looked even worse.
He glanced up.
The broken tusk, still glowing faintly with residual lightning energy, was wedged into the ice. A weapon they couldn't use.
The mammoth began its final charge—rage in every step.
And that's when it happened.
[System Notification: Your Monster Tamer gift is reacting to the Ice Mammoth. If you wish to tame this monster, say the word: "Tame."]
Everything was moving too fast. His head was ringing. The mammoth's massive frame was nearly upon them.
Denzel didn't think.
He opened his mouth.
"TAME!"
End Of Chapter